Hi. I'm Gill at engVid, and the lesson
we're having today is about similes. And just to explain
what a simile is: It's when you compare two different things.
Okay? Now, there's another lesson that we have about metaphors and at
the beginning of that one, we explain the difference between
metaphors and similes. So I'm going to do the same
again with this lesson. So, the simile is when you say A is like B-okay?-or
A is as big as B or as small as B, so it's comparing using "like" or "as". Whereas the
metaphor is when you say A is B. If you say: "He is a pig", it's not literally true, but
he behaves like a pig. But: "He is a pig" is a metaphor. If you say: "He is like a pig",
that's a simile because you're using the word "like" and comparing him with a pig.
Okay. So, let's just have a look at a few examples.
Also, because similes use either "like" or "as", we're going to look at some examples using
"like" to begin with, and then we'll move on to look at a few "as" examples. So
these are all examples that you would hear in everyday life that people tend to
use, so they're quite familiar ones. Okay, so first one: "She eats like a pig."
Which isn't a very nice thing to say about someone, but if she's quite... Makes a mess
and a lot of noise, you know what a pig eats like, she eats like a pig. So it's not a very
nice thing to say about someone, but it's comparing "she", a woman or a girl,
comparing her to the way a pig eats. "She eats like a pig."
So that's a simile. So, a similar example to that is: "He drinks
like a fish." This usually means alcohol. Not just water, but it's usually
alcohol; beer, wine, whisky, anything. "He drinks like a fish." Again, it's not
a nice thing to say about somebody, but it can sometimes be true, so... Of course, fish, I don't know if fish
actually drink water, but because they live under water, they're immersed in water; water
is all around them. So that's the idea, this man who drinks is surrounded by liquid. It's
that sort of idea. "He drinks like a fish." Okay, next example is using... We've got
animals, and fish, and another animal now: "I've been working like a dog." And
that means working really hard. Okay. Working like a dog. You
may know a Beatle song called "A Hard Day's Night", and
that is part of the lyrics of that song. Okay. "I've been working like a
dog." Which is actually true at the moment, but I've been quite enjoying
it, so that's all right. Okay. Maybe if you're talking about two children, a
brother and a sister, for example, who are always fighting-this often
happens, I think-you can say: "They are fighting
like cat and dog." Because cats and dogs don't always... They're
not always very friendly with each other. So traditionally, cats and dogs perhaps fight.
So: "They are fighting like cat and dog." Okay. So all of these,
it's "like", comparing. Okay? So two children,
human children compared to a cat and a dog because
they're fighting. Okay? Coming back to a little bit like eating, drinking:
Smoking is another thing that people do, which isn't a very healthy thing to do.
So if you say to someone: "You smoke like a chimney." Cigarettes, cigars, a pipe, maybe, any tobacco.
And a chimney is what you get on a house, the smoke comes out of the chimney. There's
the roof of the house, the smoke comes out of the chimney if you have a fire in the
house. So if you say to your friend: "You smoke like a chimney." it's
not a very nice thing to say, but maybe you will
persuade them to stop smoking, because it's
very bad for your health. Okay. So, that's a very
common expression anyway. And then finally in this section, you can
say... If you're waiting for something and you're waiting a really
long time, you can say: "It's like watching paint dry." If you've been painting a wall or a door with a
paint and a brush, when you've painted something, it takes a few hours for the paint to dry. So
if you're waiting for something to happen, and you're waiting, and you'd rather like
it to happen quite quickly, but you've been waiting 10 minutes and it's still not happening,
you can say: "It's like watching paint dry." You know, if you stand there watching while
the paint dries for two or three hours, that's a very frustrating thing to do. You don't
normally have to do that. If you paint something, you just walk away and get on with something
else. But this is quite a clever expression for something that's making you feel impatient.
Okay. Right, so that's the "like" ones, and we'll now move on to the
look at the "as" examples. Okay, so moving on to the second part of similes,
we're looking at the ones that use "as". As something, as something. Okay, which is,
again, still comparing two different things. So, first example: "She's as timid as a mouse."
So a little mouse that's very timid, meaning frightened, shy. So if a person is very shy and
they don't speak very much or they're very quiet: "She's as timid as a mouse."
So "as timid as a mouse", so we use "as" twice. Okay? And then if I take my glasses off, I
can't see very well, so I can say: "I'm as blind as a bat
without my glasses." Okay? Oh, you're still there, good.
Okay. So: "as blind as a bat".
Some of the... Because it's two b's it sort of makes
a pattern a bit like in poetry. "As blind as a bat". If you know... Do you
know what a bat is? A sort of... It's like a mouse with wings, and you know Dracula,
Dracula is supposed to be... To turn into a bat, and them from a bat back to being Dracula
again. So that's a bat. And they... Apparently they can't see very well; they find
their way via radar or something. So: "I'm as blind as a bat without my
glasses." Or spectacles. Okay. So, this sentence, I hope you're not going
to say this about me, because this says: "That explanation is
as clear as mud." Okay? So, we've got "as" twice again.
The explanation, I've just been explaining something, it...
Clear is good. Oh, yeah, clear explanation, very clear, we understand. But what about
mud? Mud is... It's like soil with a lot of water in it, so it's very thick and brown
and sticky, and you can't see through it. It's not like looking through a window. Mud,
it's not clear. Mud is the opposite of clear, so this is a little sort of joke,
really or what you call a paradox. A paradox to say it's as clear as mud, which means it's not clear
at all. Okay? So I hope my explanations... I hope you're not saying this about me
and the way I'm explaining things. Okay. If a friend of yours has a shock, something
shocks them, something bad happens, and their face instead of having lovely pink cheeks,
if their face goes completely white... Of course, it depends on the colour of their
skin, but if they're like me and they have white skin and they've got no pink in their
cheeks, and they look totally white and [gasps] a look of shock on their
face, you can say: "You've gone as
white as a sheet!" So there's "as" again. White, obviously, colour
white. A sheet, like on a bed, the white sheet you put on the bed is a sheet, a bedsheet, a white...
And they are often white. So you've gone, meaning your face has become
as white as a sheet. So: "Oh, what's happened? What's...? What's wrong?
You've gone as white as a sheet! What's the matter?" So that's the idea with that one.
Okay? Then finally in this section: Children are often
not very well-behaved, but in this example, they are very
well-behaved because: "The children have
been as good as gold." So, again, we've got this... The same letter, and "as". So we had
"as blind as a bat", now we've got "as good as gold" with the same letter repeated;
just a nice little pattern. I suppose gold is good, it's quite valuable. It looks nice,
shiny, clean. So I suppose this is why this saying has come about: "The children have been as good
as gold." They've really been good. They've behaved well. There's been no
trouble at all. Okay, so that's the end of this section, and there's just
one more little section to come. Okay, so let's continue with the final section
on similes, and these are a couple of poetic examples, kind of like poetry, because similes,
as well as metaphors, often appear in poetry. Right, so two poetic examples. So
this one we've got the word "like": "My love is like a
red, red rose." Okay? And that's in quite a famous
poem by a Scottish poet called Robert Burns. And it's also been set to music,
so people sing it as a song as well. So... And again, with poetry, you often get the same
letters repeated because it makes a nice pattern in the sound. So: "My love
is like a red, red, rose." So the simile is
comparing a woman to a red rose, because the red rose is
beautiful and so is the woman. Okay? Right. And then our final example is called... It's
a nursery rhyme, something that you sing to children. Okay? So the nursery is the place
where... In a big house, you'd have a room called a nursery where you put the children
and look... They sort of grow up there, and they might even have a nurse in the nursery; a
nanny who looks after them if it's a rich family. Okay, so this one, I'm going to sing this. Can
you bear it? Okay, here it goes. Oh, "twinkle", let me explain first. When a star twinkles,
it's when you look at a star and the light is going like this. You can see it when you
look up in the sky at night, a sort of little flashing effect; twinkle. You can also say
someone has a twinkle in their eye, if they're looking sort of amused about something.
So I'll give the words first: "Twinkle, twinkle little star",
so you're talking to a star. "How I wonder what you are.
Up above the world so high Like a diamond in the sky..." A diamond
is a precious stone that you have in a ring, often an engagement ring; a big,
white, precious stone. Okay, so a diamond twinkles, and so does the star, going like
this. It catches the light. Okay? So, I don't know if you've heard this
song before, but here we go: "Twinkle, twinkle little star
How I wonder what you are. Up above the world so high
Like a diamond in the sky. Twinkle, twinkle little star
How I wonder what you are." Okay? So that's how it goes. You might want to
play this again, and join in with me. Okay? Drown my voice. Okay, so that's some examples of similes.
I hope you found that helpful. Please visit the website, www.engvid.com,
where there is a quiz on this topic. Please, also, if you've enjoyed this lesson,
please subscribe to my channel on YouTube. And that's it for now. Hope to see you again next time.
Okay. Bye.
